‘Yes, it worked all right for you, Janet, but she blamed me in no small voice when she got in last night because she said I had given her the wrong impression of you and your whole family.’
She shook her head. ‘You know something? I think she’ll be payin’ London a visit pretty often after this, if you ask me.’
‘After last night, I’ve no doubt about it. Well, I’d better go and see her.’
As I was crossing the hall I met Georgie who said, ‘Mornin’, lass.’
‘Morning, Georgie. Have a nice time last night?’ My voice was prim.
‘Never better. Bugger me eyes! You should have seen her. I can only remember bits. Eeh! She was at the height of her form. I can tell you that, lass. And aren’t they a nice crowd, Janet’s folk?’
‘Where is she?’ I asked.
He thumbed towards the dining room: ‘Hidin’ her head, I think. Go canny on her.’
I slanted my eyes at him, then went into the dining room. She was sitting looking out of the window. She had her back to me, but she knew it was me, as her words proved when she said, ‘Now don’t you start.’
‘Who’s going to start?’
She remained still until I was by her side, and then, turning towards me, she said, ‘Oh, you might as well say your piece; if you don’t say it now you’ll say it some time.’
‘I’m not going to say any piece, only with a face like that you’d think you were going to a funeral and not a wedding this morning.’
‘Aw, lass.’ She put her hand to her head. ‘I must have gone really over the top. A drop an’ me aren’t strangers as you know, but I feel I must have got attached to a hogshead last night.’
‘You enjoyed yourself though?’
She focused her eyes now on the outside scene of first-floor roofs and patches of garden, and after a moment she said, ‘Well, we can all make mistakes, can’t we? But you’ve got to admit, from the look of her’—now her gaze flashed at me—‘you’d never think she bred that lot.’
‘But I’ve told you before, haven’t I?’
‘Aye, you have; but you have to see them to believe them. All I can think of is that some of Nardy’s mother must have rubbed off on her, her manners like.’ Then a twisted smile coming onto her face, she said, ‘Plainly it didn’t rub off onto her family.’
I pushed her.
She narrowed her eyes now as she looked at me, saying, ‘I see you’re all made up. You nearly ready?’
‘Yes; just my suit to slip on.’
‘Well, here you go for a third time. Eeh! Who would believe it? And you’re the one who imagined that nobody would ever want you. Do you remember?’
‘Yes, yes, I remember.’
‘An’ went an’ married that maniac. You know’—she leant towards me—‘there’s strange rumours goin’ round about him: what he was up to afore he did himself in or somebody did him in, one or t’other, ’cos from all accounts he was hated in there as bad as bairn abusers. But they were sayin’ in the club he was dealin’ in black magic. Now that’s so far-fetched I told them they wanted to get their heads looked. How could he deal with black magic in there? He’d have no chance of startin’ a convent in there, now would he?’
I stopped a loud explosion coming from my lips and said quietly, ‘You’re thinking of coven.’
‘What?’
‘What you’re thinking of is called a coven. It’s usually applied to witches, a coven of witches.’
She stretched her nose, pushed out her lips, then said, ‘Well, I suppose you should know. Whatever it was, they said he started it. But some people’ll say anything … How you feelin’?’
‘All right.’
She nodded, then said, ‘In a way you’ve had a bellyful, but in another way you’ve been lucky, you’ve had two men that are the salt of the earth.’
She now bent towards me and her head emphasised each word as she added, ‘One thing I’ll ask of you, for the future that is, keep out of the papers. It got that way I couldn’t open the Journal or the Evening Chronicle ’cos there you were, headlines, an’ I had to stand the racket at the club. So I’m tellin’ you.’
‘I’ll do my best, Gran.’ My tone was polite. Then changing it, I barked at her, ‘And now, you old misery, go and get yourself ready, and quick! We’re due out in a half-hour’s time.’
She got to her feet, a tight smile on her face now as she said, ‘You don’t change, do you?’ And I answered in the same vein, ‘And I’m not the only one, am I?’
‘Aw, lass.’ She suddenly bent towards me and kissed me, saying now, ‘Things haven’t been right atween us for some time. That’s all over. It’s me, I know. You see, I … I thought I had lost you altogether, but now I know I haven’t, you’re still my lass.’
We held each other tightly; then, pushing me away, she walked smartly down the room. But at the door she turned and said, ‘That bit was only soft soap ’cos I want a trip on that boat of yours.’
When the door closed on her I stood blinking and smiling to myself. That boat of mine. In her eyes it was already mine. And there was no doubt, too, as Janet had suggested, that she would be making the journey from Newcastle to London more often in the future.
I went to my room, and there I got into my suit and four-inch-heeled shoes to give me just a little added height. Next I placed an apology for a hat on the top of my head and, looking in the mirror, I saw a woman in her middle thirties who, although still plain, did not look her age. Next, I picked up my handbag and matching gloves and went out and into the corridor, and across it towards the far end I could glimpse Harold’s door was open and I could hear his voice talking rapidly to someone. I looked into his room, and there he was with Sandy. The dog had its forepaws on his chest and was licking his face and my adopted son was admonishing it in his most natural form: ‘Stop it, you soapy sod,’ he was saying. ‘If you spoil me tie I’ll pull up your guts an’ strangle your tonsils with ’em.’
I did not rush into the room and upbraid him, this wasn’t the time, but I stepped back and leant against the wall for a moment, repeating, ‘I’ll pull up your guts and strangle your tonsils with them.’ That was certainly a new one.
As I made to walk away, there he was coming out of the room, half bent over, keeping Sandy down with one hand. He stopped, straightened up, looked up at me for a long moment, then said, ‘I … I wasn’t swearin’, not really. Well … ’
This was no time for a confrontation, so I said, ‘Who said you were?’
‘Your face.’
‘My face?’
‘You always look like that when I’m swearin’.’
‘Oh. Well, if that wasn’t swearing, what was it?’
‘You … you mean about pullin’ up the guts and … ’
‘Yes, yes, that’s what I mean.’ I noticed we had bypassed soapy sod.
‘John Rankin learned me it.’
‘Taught me.’
‘What?’
‘Taught me?’
‘Oh, well, yes, well I only said it ’cos of him.’ He stabbed his finger towards Sandy. ‘You see, he was jumpin’ up an’ upsettin’ me tie.’
He was wearing a white frilled shirt, topped by a bow tie.
I bent forward and straightened it, and as I did so he looked to the side, gave a yell and said, ‘There’s Mr Tommy!’ and darted from me.
I stayed where I was looking down the corridor into the hall, and there was this tall attractive man. He was always well dressed, but this morning he looked different, not younger, older, if anything, and very, very handsome.
As that unnerving, irritating and questioning thing called my mind opened a door yet again to ask, What did he see in me? I kicked it closed and turned swiftly and went back into my bedroom, and a minute later he knocked on the door, and when I said, ‘Come in,’ he came in, saying, ‘What made you disappear like that?’
‘Oh’—I made a small face—‘I wanted to bang a door.’
‘Bang a door?’
‘Yes. I�
��ll tell you about it later.’
‘Have you had trouble with his nibs?’
‘No. Why do you ask?’
He smiled before he said, ‘He’s just said to me: “She thinks I swored.”’
‘Well, he did, and brought out a new one.’
At this point it struck me to ask myself why we should be standing here talking about my charge and not about ourselves? But I went on to explain how I overheard Harold’s reprimand to the dog: ‘Soapy sod, I’ve heard before,’ I said, ‘but never, I’ll pull your guts up and strangle your tonsils with them.’
‘What?’ He was shaking with laughter.
‘Just that: pull your guts up and strangle your tonsils with them.’ I too was shaking now, saying, ‘Did you ever?’
I fell against him. His arms were about me and his voice came over my head: ‘Well, there’s one thing, my dear,’ he said, ‘we’ll never be dull where he is. But then’—he pressed me from him and looked down into my face—‘I’ll never be dull where you are. That’s your charm, you know.’ He looked me up and down. ‘You look lovely.’
‘I don’t look lovely. Smart, yes, but not lovely.’
‘Why do you … ? Oh, shut up, and come along! I want a wife.’
We clung together again; then we went out and there in the hall was Gran, and George, and Harold, and Janet. But Janet wasn’t dressed for outside.
Tommy now said, ‘Hello there, Georgie. Hello Gran. How did it go last night? Enjoy yourselves?’
Her face perky, Gran said, ‘Oh, she hasn’t told you then?’ She now turned and smiled at Janet, saying, ‘It’s a wonder she didn’t get that in, isn’t it?’ And then she added, ‘You should be comin’, you know.’
What a changed Gran. And Janet, smiling at her, said on a laugh, ‘I could never stand weddings. They recall the mistake I made many years ago. And anyway, somebody’s got to see to the caterers.’ She now cast her glance towards me. ‘Everything’ll be in order when you get back. So get yourselves away.’
We were going into the outer hall when I stopped, and turning to Janet and for the first time in our acquaintance, I kissed her and said softly, ‘Thank you, Janet, for everything right down the years, and especially for Harold.’ Then we held each other tightly for a moment until she said, ‘Oh, go on with you.’ Her nose wrinkled and she chewed on her bottom lip, then pushed me through the door into the outer hall.
Gran and Georgie were now in the lift. Harold was standing at one side of it and Tommy at the other, their faces bright and smiling, and they both said almost in unison, ‘Come on, if you’re coming.’
And I went towards them and into another world.
The End
Harold Page 24